Young people lead the way at Stockton's March For Our Lives

Roger Phillips Record Staff Writer @rphillipsblog

Saturday

Mar 24, 2018 at 8:15 PMMar 25, 2018 at 12:33 PM

STOCKTON — Six years later, she still remembers the date.

But, then again, nothing ever has been quite the same for Anahi Ballesteros since Oct. 8, 2012, when she was a seventh-grader at Van Buren Elementary and a fellow student fired a single shot from his .22-caliber handgun into the classroom’s floor.

“I remember that day clearly,” the 17-year-old, now a senior at Franklin High School, told the crowd gathered before her Saturday morning in a downtown park.

“I remember the sounds, the screams of my classmates, my teacher screaming and calling someone on the intercom. … Then I looked down to my feet and see a bullet next to my pink Van’s. I don’t recall much of what happed after that.”

Ballesteros shared her story to about 400 people, young and old, who attended Stockton’s March For Our Lives at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Plaza. Even going Saturday to a large gathering of like-minded people put her on edge, Ballesteros said.

“I’m always looking for an escape route, planning ahead, because it’s just something that’s always in me, every single day,” she said. “Even today ... I was, like, ‘What if someone starts shooting, what way do I run?’ ”

Stockton’s March For Our Lives event was one of more than 800 held around the world Saturday, 38 days after a gunman walked onto a Parkland, Florida, high school campus and opened fire, killing 14 students and three staff members.

The downtown march, beneath clouds and punctuated by sometimes-strong showers, was organized by Valentino Silva, a Humphreys University student pursuing a legal studies degree.

“I’m 18 years old,” Silva told the crowd. “I have been told that I am too young to be talking about gun violence issues and too inexperienced to be hosting a march today. However, look, I did it. I am too inexperienced to be hosting a march and talking about gun issues. However, I am the same 18-year-old that is able to buy a weapon of mass instruction.”

Following are more of the stories and sights Saturday in downtown Stockton.

A survivor

By the time Jasmine Dellafosse graduated from Edison High School, nearly 10 of her classmates had perished because of gun violence over a four-year span.

Today, the 22-year-old works for the nonprofit Stockton Schools Initiative. But events such as Saturday’s march never fail to evoke memories of those difficult years at Edison.

“A lot of this work became very close to home,” Dellafosse told the crowd. “I’ve lost so many friends."

Dellafosse finished by leading a rousing recitation of the words of Assata Shakur, an African-American activist:

“It is our duty to fight for our freedom/

It is our duty to win/

We must love and support one another/

We have nothing to lose but our chains.”

The singer

Kristina Perry, a 16-year-old junior at Bear Creek High School, did her talking with her guitar and the lyrics of a song she wrote after last year’s mass slaughter at a music festival in Las Vegas.

“Hate is something we’ve become so used to/

So why do we keep sitting around/

Saying there’s nothing I can do?”

In a brief interview afterward, Perry said the deaths of 58 in Las Vegas inspired her to write because she had seen “how much hate is out there.”

She added, “If we come together, the love will overpower the hate.”

Signs of the times

Marchers waved signs as they walked up and down El Dorado and Center streets.

Here are three samples:

“Classrooms are for learning, not for killing”

“The only thing easier to buy than a gun is a politician!”

One sign included the logo of the National Rifle Association and these words: “No lives matter”

Calls for voting, activism

Mana Shoostari, a 17-year-old Lincoln High School senior, urged young people to register to vote, and also to make sure to write letters or call politicians.

She had one additional tip.

“Take a few minutes to pen an email or even a Tweet,” she said, “since certain politicians clearly prefer 280 characters over a speech.”

A voice of experience

Julia Schardt and several others from Cleveland School Remembers were among the last to step to the microphone. Schardt, 70, was a teacher at Cleveland Elementary when five children were killed there by a gunman in 1989.

“For the past month we have been learning from our children,” Schardt said. “We have learned that our community is rich with young people who can challenge the way things are to make this world a better place for all of us.”

A last word

Silva, the event’s organizer, said putting the march together took 23 days, many of them sleep-deprived. He said he was proud of the determined young people he witnessed Saturday.